


Pyramid

by r_lee



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-10
Updated: 2010-07-10
Packaged: 2017-10-10 11:53:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/99480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/r_lee/pseuds/r_lee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam remembers his first game of pyramid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pyramid

The best part about being a fifth-grader was that finally, _finally,_ they got to play pyramid. Before that it was just crap like roundball or keep-away, maybe a tiny bit of softball. But the big news about Grade 5 was that's when pyramid training started, at least at Noyse Elementary School. The very first day was one he could never forget: the feel of the gloves and pads, the weight of the ball in his hand, the rough-and-tumble scrambling for the ball, his first goal. It didn't matter that the equipment was old and shitty and falling apart; it didn't matter that countless generations of pyramid wannabes had used and abused it all for so long: the minute he put on the accouterments of the uniform, he felt like he was home at last.

It was a frak of a thing, that first game, and for years it drove him to visit that same pyramid arena out behind the school every frakking day, rain or shine, so he could get better and better and better. The day he got scouted by the Buccaneers was one of the best frakking days of his life. He remembers speeding home on his motorcycle, couldn't _wait_ to tell his parents. Scouted out of high school, just like he'd wanted since that day in fifth grade.

*

Or the first game of pyramid played by Samuel T. Anders was at an open tryout for the widely-scorned C-Bucs. He was nineteen years old, handy with the ball, good in the neutral zone, and where he picked it up was a matter of mystery as far as the press was concerned but who cared? He was good, good enough to make the team as a reserve, good enough to move up through the ranks, good enough to become team captain within a couple short years. Good enough to become a local sports hero, for whatever that was worth. It wasn't the game itself that kept him going but his relentless quest to achieve _perfection_ in the game. The win-loss column didn't matter as much to him as it did to everyone else; he never insisted on being the hero and doing everything for the team. No, all he wanted was that one perfect goal, that one-two-three-steps-and-shoot-a-perfect-arc grace. He'd always told himself the day he attained that was the day he'd hang up his gloves and pads, take a final soak in the hot tub after the game, and call it a day.

Luckily it was part of the human condition to strive for but never reach perfection. He hadn't met that final game yet.

*

The first time Sam Anders donned gloves and pads and suited up for pyramid was on the planet Earth at the Athena Arena. He was fifteen years old, scared to frak it up but also confident as anything. He still had a little growing to do -- hadn't yet reached his full height -- but he was tough and scrappy, and he fouled out of the game but not before scoring the go-ahead goal. For the next handful of years he played pyramid as an aside, as a break from the research and experiments that came to engulf more and more of his time. He always had a soft spot for the game, even when he put away his equipment and dedicated himself to science full-time.

Sometimes, when he wasn't experimenting or writing songs or seeing things no one else saw, he'd go back to the arena and walk its perimeter, imagining himself young and scrappy and full of untested promise, racing back and forth on that court like an engine without an off switch.

Pyramid was one frak of a game.


End file.
